The Archdiocese of Los Angeles (, ) is an archdiocese of the Catholic Church located in the southern part of California in the United States, The archdiocese contains the counties of Los Angeles, Santa Barbara, and Ventura. The cathedral is the Cathedral of Our Lady of the Angels in Los Angeles, and its present archbishop is José Horacio Gómez Velasco.
With over five million professing members and weekly liturgies celebrated in 32 languages, the Archdiocese of Los Angeles is numerically the single largest and most ethnically diverse archdiocese in the United States.Archdiocese of Los Angeles Directory, 2020
The archbishop of Los Angeles also serves as metropolitan bishop of the suffragan dioceses within the Ecclesiastical Province of Los Angeles, which includes the dioceses of Fresno, Monterey, Orange, San Bernardino, and San Diego.
Spanish Franciscan missionaries established Spanish missions in the region during the 18th century, but they were abandoned by 1834. The Vatican established the diocese of the Two Californias in 1840, when the Los Angeles region was still part of Mexico. In 1848, Mexican California was ceded to the United States, and the American portion of the diocese was renamed the Diocese of Monterey. The diocese was renamed the Diocese of Monterey-Los Angeles in 1859, and the episcopal see was moved to Los Angeles upon the completion of the Cathedral of Saint Vibiana in 1876. Los Angeles split from Monterey to become the Diocese of Los Angeles-San Diego in 1922. The diocese was split again in 1936 to create the Diocese of San Diego, and the Los Angeles was seen elevated to an archdiocese. The archdiocese's present territory was established in 1976, when Orange County was split off to establish the Diocese of Orange.
The sexual abuse scandal in the archdiocese resulted in a $880 million court settlement in 2024; bringing the total settlement payouts for the archdiocese to over $1.5 billion. Instances of sexual abuse within the archdiocese have been documented back to the 1930s, though instances from the 1970s through 1990s have been more highly publicized.
History
1500 to 1800 The first Catholic presence in the present-day archdiocese was that of priests who accompanied the Spanish expedition of Juan Cabrillo in 1542 and Sebastian Vizcaíno in 1602. During the 18th century, the Spanish established a chain of 21 missions, operated by the Franciscan Order, in present-day California to solidify their territorial claims to the area.
The goal of the missions was to convert members of the Native American tribes in what was now the Spanish province of Alta California. Once they were baptised, these converts were forced to live at the missions, where worked in the fields and built the mission churches and other buildings. The missions soon controlled large blocks of land in the province and amassed great wealth.
The first of three missions in the archdiocese was the Mission San Buenaventura, founded in Ventura in 1749 by the missionary Junipero Serra to evangelize the Chumash people. It was followed in 1771 by the Mission San Gabriel Arcángel in San Gabriel, established by the missionaries Benito Cambon and Angel Somera for the Tongva people. This mission served as the base for the founding of Los Angeles.
The first parish church in Santa Barbara was Our Lady of Sorrows, established in 1782 to serve the Spanish soldiers stationed at the presidio, or fort, in that community. It was followed in 1789 by the third mission, Mission Santa Barbara, founded to evangelize the Chumash.
1800 to 1848 The first Catholic church in the City of Los Angeles was La Iglesia de Nuestra Señora la Reina de los Ángeles, founded in 1814 in what became the downtown of the city.
After the end of the Mexican War of Independence in 1822, control of Alta California passed from Spain to the new Mexican Empire. Mexico in 1834 passed a law that required all the missions to disgorge most of their property holdings and free the Native American converts from servitude. As a result, the Franciscans abandoned the missions, leaving them in disrepair.
In 1840, Pope Gregory XVI erect the Diocese of California. It was also called "Diocese of Two Californias" or "Diocese of Both Californias". Gregory XVI set the episcopal see in San Diego . The new diocese included the following Mexican territories:
Alta California, encompassing the present American states of California, Nevada, Arizona and Utah, along with western Colorado and southwestern Wyoming Baja California Territory, encompassing the present Mexican states of Baja California and Baja California Sur
1848 to 1900
After the conclusion of the Mexican American War in 1848, Mexico surrendered control of Alta California to the United States. Mexico then petitioned the Vatican to divide the Diocese of California into American and Mexican dioceses. On November 20, 1849, the American diocese became the Diocese of Monterey, with the episcopal see in Monterey, California.Greg Erlandson, Editor in Chief, et al, Our Sunday Visitor's Catholic Almanac, 2015 Edition, Our Sunday Visitor, Inc., Huntington, Inc., 2015, p. 378. California gained statehood in 1850.
In 1853, Pope Pius IX erected the Archdiocese of San Francisco, taking Nevada, Utah, and much of Northern California from the Diocese of Monterey. In 1859, Pius IX renamed the Diocese of Monterey as the Diocese of Monterey-Los Angeles to recognize the growth of the city of Los Angeles. The bishop moved his principal residence to Los Angeles, with the Mission Santa Barbara serving as its pro-cathedral. In 1856, the Daughters of Charity opened the Los Angeles Infirmary, the first Catholic hospital in Los Angeles. It became the former St. Vincent Medical Center.
The Congregation of the Mission opened the St. Vincent's College for Boys in Los Angeles in 1865. It was the first institution of higher learning in Los Angeles. The Cathedral of Saint Vibiana was dedicated in Los Angeles in 1876. St. Monica Parish, erected in 1882 in Santa Monica, was the first parish in that city. St. Andrew's Catholic Parish was founded in Pasadena in 1886.
1900 to 1948
In 1902, St. Anthony Parish was established in Long Beach. Blessed Sacrament Parish, which opened in Hollywood in 1904, came to serve many Catholics working in the film industry. In Burbank, St. Robert Bellarmine Parish was founded in 1907. That same year, the first parish in Glendale, Holy Family, opened. St. Vincent College closed in 1911, to be replaced by Loyola College in Los Angeles.
By 1917, the Diocese of Monterey-Los Angeles had a Catholic population of 180,000 with 276 priests serving in 128 parishes, 85 missions, and 93 stations. The diocese had 44 parochial schools with 9,000 students. On June 1, 1922, Pope Pius XI changed the Diocese of Monterey-Los Angeles to the Diocese of Los Angeles-San Diego, removing the counties in northern and central California.Ibid., p. 378. It now included Imperial, Los Angeles, Orange, Riverside, San Bernardino, San Diego, Santa Barbara, and Ventura Counties. In 1923, the Sisters of Charity of the Incarnate Word established St. Mary's Hospital in Long Beach. It is today part of Dignity Health.
In 1925, the Sisters of St. Joseph of Carondelet established Mount Saint Mary's University, the only university for women in Southern California. The Religious of the Sacred Heart of Mary opened Marymount Junior College in the Westwood area of Los Angeles in 1933. It later became Marymount College.
On July 11, 1936, Pius XI split the Diocese of Los Angeles-San Diego into the Archdiocese of Los Angeles and the Diocese of San Diego.Ibid., p. 379Ibid., p. 382. The pope named Bishop John Joseph Cantwell of Los Angeles-San Diego as the first bishop of the new archdiocese. St. John's Hospital in Santa Monica was founded as a military hospital during World War II by the Sisters of Charity of Leavenworth: it is today Provident Saint John's Health Center.
Cantwell's tenure was a period of growth for the Catholic Church in Southern California. By the time of his death in 1947, the archdiocese had a Catholic population of 601,200 with 688 priests, 217 parishes, 44 missions, 20 stations, four Catholic colleges and universities with 2,350 total students, 35 Catholic high schools with 8,673 total students, and 115 Catholic elementary schools with 38,821 total students. Cantwell established Los Angeles College, a minor seminary, in 1927 and St. John's Seminary in Camarillo in 1938. Cantwell died in 1947.
1948 to 1976
In 1948, Pope Pius XII named Auxiliary Bishop James Francis McIntyre of the Archdiocese of New York as the second archbishop of Los Angeles. In McIntyre's first four years, the archdiocese established 26 new parishes, 64 new parochial schools, and 18 new high schools. At one point during his tenure, he oversaw the construction of a new church every 66 days and a new school every 26 days to accommodate the post-World War II population boom in Southern California. I
The Sisters of the Holy Cross in 1961 opened Holy Cross Medical Center in the Mission Hills section of Los Angeles. It is today Providence Holy Cross Medical Center. In 1967, McIntyre banned members of the Sisters of the Immaculate Heart of Mary from teaching in schools in the archdiocese. The nuns had recently abandoned some traditional elements of cloistered life, such as compulsory daily prayer and the wearing of habits in the classroom. In 1968, the Sacred Congregation of Religious in Rome ruled that the nuns had to restore their former practices or request dispensation from their vows.
In 1969, Pope Paul VI named Bishop Timothy Manning of the Diocese of Fresno as coadjutor archbishop in Los Angeles to assist McIntyre. When McIntyre retired in 1970, Manning automatically succeeded him as archbishop. While a strong proponent of ecclesiastical authority, Manning assumed a gentler style than his predecessor. The end of McIntyre's tenure saw tensions with the clergy and minorities. Following Manning's ascension, he stated, "My first reaction was to make it known that I was here to listen."
Manning instituted ministries for blacks and Hispanics, a presbyterial council to grant the clergy greater participation in the governance of the archdiocese, and an Inter-Parochial Council to extend the same participation to the laity. Shortly after becoming archbishop, a majority of the Sisters of the Immaculate Heart of Mary, who had feuded with McIntyre, left the religious life and founded a lay community. He also supported the 1973 merger of the all-male Loyola University and all-female Marymount College into Loyola Marymount University in 1973; McIntyre had resisted attempts to allow co-education in the archdiocese's university and colleges.
1976 to 2000
On March 24, 1976, Paul VI erected the Diocese of Orange, taking Orange County from the Archdiocese.Ibid., p. 380. This action also established the present territory of the archdiocese: Los Angeles, Santa Barbara, and Ventura Counties. Manning retired as archbishop in 1985. That same year, Pope John Paul II named Bishop Roger Mahony of the Diocese of Stockton as the next archbishop of Los Angeles.
In 1986, Archbishop Roger Mahony divided the archdiocese into five pastoral regions, each led by an auxiliary bishop who functioned as the region's episcopal vicar.